Baby step: tailor your green message
Here it is. Days before American Thanksgiving, the biggest travel and family gathering time of the year. Thanksgiving brings families together to reconnect, eat, see how much the kids have grown, eat, get on each other's nerves, eat, bicker, eat, hopefully go for a walk, eat some more, and then go home so tweaked off at one another that you won't speak again for another year! Nah, hopefully that's just an exaggeration. Our family doesn't fight too much. We get on each others' nerves but are more prone to biting our tongues.
If you're anything like me, you've gained a reputation for being the eco-freak of the family. Quite possibly, you've got an uncle who is just itching for you to bring up global warming so he can tell you what a load of conspiracy crap you've bought into and make mincemeat (not pie) of you. Take a step back, and reconsider your green lifestyle. If saving the planet is your goal, so be it. But think of it in terms that others may better relate to. Case in point. I had coffee with a friend a few weeks ago thanks to a Facebook post of hers about wanting to get one of those single shot plastic cup/coffee brewing machines, and I couldn't stop myself from advising her not to do it. All those bleeping little plastic cups! It just made me ill. I felt I needed to save her. So we met and I pleaded my case. Save the world from a stream of plastic cups! Don't buy it! Truth be told, I don't think she cared a whit about the waste, environment or plastic. She's just not there, you know? My cause, not hers. Then I remembered that she was a big supporter of the Susan Komen Race for the Cure. So I changed my angle. I started talking about health and the toxins in plastics and the possibility of plastics adding to our body burden. The myriad possible causes of cancer. Truthfully, I am woefully unschooled on toxins. But I got her attention. And I think she chose not to buy that coffee maker, for far different reasons than I had started out with.
Just food for thought (and at least this food is calorie free). Think about what you do. Maybe you love a good fight and can't wait to talk turkey with that uncle and make mincemeat out of him! But saving the planet isn't the only benefit of the many green things we do. And if you frame your lifestyle in terms of frugality, a return to old ways, or health, you may just enlist a few more soldiers in the green army even though they might not call it that.
If you're anything like me, you've gained a reputation for being the eco-freak of the family. Quite possibly, you've got an uncle who is just itching for you to bring up global warming so he can tell you what a load of conspiracy crap you've bought into and make mincemeat (not pie) of you. Take a step back, and reconsider your green lifestyle. If saving the planet is your goal, so be it. But think of it in terms that others may better relate to. Case in point. I had coffee with a friend a few weeks ago thanks to a Facebook post of hers about wanting to get one of those single shot plastic cup/coffee brewing machines, and I couldn't stop myself from advising her not to do it. All those bleeping little plastic cups! It just made me ill. I felt I needed to save her. So we met and I pleaded my case. Save the world from a stream of plastic cups! Don't buy it! Truth be told, I don't think she cared a whit about the waste, environment or plastic. She's just not there, you know? My cause, not hers. Then I remembered that she was a big supporter of the Susan Komen Race for the Cure. So I changed my angle. I started talking about health and the toxins in plastics and the possibility of plastics adding to our body burden. The myriad possible causes of cancer. Truthfully, I am woefully unschooled on toxins. But I got her attention. And I think she chose not to buy that coffee maker, for far different reasons than I had started out with.
Just food for thought (and at least this food is calorie free). Think about what you do. Maybe you love a good fight and can't wait to talk turkey with that uncle and make mincemeat out of him! But saving the planet isn't the only benefit of the many green things we do. And if you frame your lifestyle in terms of frugality, a return to old ways, or health, you may just enlist a few more soldiers in the green army even though they might not call it that.
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